Learning Safety Through the Experience of Others

by Charley Shimanski

It is often said that "experience is the best teacher." In the world of mountaineering, an annual journal of mountaineering accidents is designed to enable mountaineers to learn from the experiences, unfortunate at best, of other mountaineers. "Accidents in North American Mountaineering" is an annual publication by The American Alpine Club, which encapsulates reports by rescue mountaineers, reporting parties, and the victims themselves. It has been published every year since 1948.

During this next year, Jed Williamson, editor of Accidents in North American Mountaineering, will compile a summary of accidents from the past few decades of mountaineering. After dismissing several working titles such as "Greatest Hits," and "The Best of Accidents in North American Mountaineering," the publication is expected to be titled "Lessons Learned."

Introduction

Ten or 11 years ago, I became involved in a rescue in the area of Hallett's Peak in Rocky Mountain National Park. The adrenaline rush was so intense that I have stayed in the rescue business ever since. Yet it is not the adrenaline rush that has kept me in the business. In more than a decade of rescue work, I have learned more from those rescue experiences than from my own personal mountaineering experiences. Experience is indeed the best teacher, especially if it is someone else who is experiencing the broken leg!

But in my experience, some of the best lessons come from the most oddball rescues you can imagine. For example...

I will always remember the little girl who, having just been found after spending a cold night alone in the mountains, complained to me (in a polite whisper) that the TV in the back of the Channel 7 helicopter "isn't a very good one," since the picture is fuzzy. She was uninterested that the picture was a direct feed of the news of her rescue. Remarkably, she was also completely calm about the whole incident of being lost overnight.

Unfortunately, the little girl's dog wasn't interested in the free scenic flight home on "Chopper 7" and thus a whole new search began. We eventually not only found her dog, but coaxed him into the Chopper, which was no easy task.

Animal search and rescue is always interesting. I once foolishly volunteered to perform a cat rescue (and I'm allergic to cats!) when a cat climbed up and up until it was 40 feet high in a 43-foot Ponderosa Pine. The cat had been howling for rescue for three days. No problem, I thought, I'll just clip in every several feet. "After all," I thought, "this tree is a class four climb at best."

That was the beginning of a whole new higher degree for me. There I was, face to face with a crash course in two important classes. My curriculum was as follows:

Tree Climbing 101;

Lesson #1 - Unlike tall mountains, tall trees sway back and forth while you climb them. And the higher you climb, the more they sway!!! (Course Requirement: Sailboat 101, Lesson #2 - Sea-sickness.)

Cat Rescue 101;

Lesson #1 - out of sheer terror, a cat who is stuck 40 feet up a 43-foot tree would rather kill you than cooperate with your rescue plan. (Course Requirement: Death By Horrible Methods 401)

I found myself in a rescue that had me baffled.

So I cut the tree down. (Not really.)

Something in Common

I realized recently that these two rescues have an interesting relationship. They represent two distinctly different victims that each behaved irrationally. After all, the cat should have been calm, since it has claws like a sharp-toothed vice and it can climb just about anything. If it had only had a partner, that cat could have danced a polka down the tree. Yet it was terrified by its proximity to the top of the tree, and its distance from the ground. (Frankly, so was I !!!)

Conversely, the little girl should have been frightened to death. She was alone in the mountains on a moonless Colorado night. She somehow had to cross a stream that should have carried her away. She had to watch a helicopter fly around her and drop off what must have looked like aliens. (Bright orange rescue uniforms tend to look that way.) Yet she was completely calm.

There is a message in both of these stories that relates to preparedness. The cat was unprepared for its fear of heights. By the time it looked down, it was too late. It was not prepared for what would happen once it got that high.

And the little girl? She was prepared because she was with her best friend... her dog! As far as she was concerned, there was no big emergency.

The cat was not prepared, the little girl was. Go figure.

Wait a Minute! I Was Told There Would Be No Math!

Question: Which state has the most annual reported cases of hypothermia?

(a) Florida
(b) Alaska
(c) Colorado
(d) Minnesota

Answer: (a) Florida. No kidding.

How could it be that Florida has more cases of hypothermia? Simple - preparedness. People in Florida are never prepared for the cold. They wander around in shorts when it is 50 degrees. They jump in water, which robs their warmth 240 times faster than the calm air. People in Alaska, Colorado, and Minnesota expect the cold. That's why Patagonia and North Face do so well in northern climates.

Question: What do you call a guy in Florida wearing a North Face jacket?

Answer: Rich.

An Eleventh Essential

If you take a basic back country safety course, you will often learn about the "Ten Essentials" - ten basic items that should be carried by all back country users. Like me, you may have modified your ten as soon as you got sick of GORP. Perhaps dried apricots have made their way into your pack.

I believe that the conventional list of Ten Essentials is missing one. The eleventh essential is one I have added to my list. It is called Postive Mental Attitude (PMA). With calmness, common sense, and especially self confidence, one can survive and help others do the same in extreme difficulties. In an EMT class ten years ago, I was taught how valuable the mind can be in preparing oneself for any situation. By simply rehearsing possibilities in your head and rehearsing how you will react in those situations, you will strengthen your self-confidence.

In the mid 1960s, East Germany's Olympic athletes improved their skills dramatically when they included visualization in their trainings. By 1968, East Germany went from being an "also-ran" in the Olympics to winning more metals per capita than any other country.

A Frightening Fact

Question:What is the most common cause of accidental death in the mountains?

(a) Falling
(b) Hypothermia
(c) Acute Mountain Sickness
(d) Avalanche

Answer: Hypothermia

On February 1, 1989, the temperature in Butte, Montana dropped from 42 degrees to -4 in one hour. Regardless of the season, a temperature drop of 30-40 degrees Fahrenheit in one hour is not uncommon in the mountains. Add cold rain and wind, and nature has mixed the perfect recipe for hypothermia.

Hypothermia results when the body loses more heat than it can generate. Effective dressing is the simplest way to avoid hypothermia in the dynamic weather of the mountains.

Through practice, you can learn to add and remove layers of clothing at just the right times. The rule of "befores" applies here. You should remove a layer of clothes before you begin sweating, add a layer before you get cold. By doing so, you can balance the amount of your body's heat generation with heat loss. Conserve your sweat, not your water!

The winter mountaineer's lunch, it is often said, begins just after breakfast. That's a small exaggeration. The well-fed mountaineer can survive extreme weather conditions much better than one with no extra calories to burn. Winter mountaineering is a lousy time to be on a diet!

If your back country adventure includes an overnight snow shelter, and if considerable time lapses between the last meal and bedtime, eat a snack before bedding down. The extra calories will produce enough heat in the body during the night to provide perhaps an additional one to two hours of sleep. Without a snack, you may be awakened by the cold.

Conclusion

As much as any essential safety skill, take your Positive Mental Attitude with you, and be prepared for the most common malady that overtakes mountaineers - hypothermia. With no more than those two skills, you will be prepared.

And by the way... avoid cat rescue at all costs!!!

Charley Shimanski has worked as an EMT for the Alpine Rescue Team for the past 12 years. He is also Education Committee Chair for the National Mountain Rescue Association (MRA) and is the author of the MRA's Helicopter and Avalanche rescue manuals. Charley is also the Executive Director of The American Alpine Club.

From Trail and Timberline, No. 915, March 1996. ©1996 Used here with permission of the author.